Last Kisses
by elizzabethavary
Summary: When Roger gets a fever, he realizes the finality of his disease. Mark's there to comfort him, while realizing the effect Roger's death will have on him. M/R.


Hey all, this is just a little drabbleish thing I came up with the other day. It was originally going to be part of a longer fic I'm working on, but I decided to post it how it is, see what you guys think. Let me know!

103.5

Mark stared at the tiny piece of plastic, it's little screen blinking with little red numbers innocently, as if they had no meaning whatsoever.

To Mark however, those numbers meant everything. In his immediate reality, it meant that Roger had a fever. That was okay, people had fevers every day in the world. It was more than a fever however. To Roger, a minor cold could be deadly. AIDS kills your immune system. A fever could kill him.

Roger looked at him expectantly, waiting for the news- the nature of his illness.

"Well?" He said, raising an eyebrow. He already knew, by the look on Mark's face. He needed him to say it though, confirm his worst fears. Give him a taste of reality. Mark looked at him regretfully.

"I'm sorry." Is what he said. He probably could have thought of a thousand better things to say. To Roger, however, I'm sorry just didn't cut it anymore. Roger looked crushed and Mark reached out to him. Tried to pretend he's not dying inside as fast as Roger's dying outwardly.

Roger's hair was long and matted, his fever making him sweat and whine. Mark brushed the damp locks away from his face. Roger frowned and smacked Mark's hand away.

"Roger, please." Mark began and Roger cut him off.

"Don't pity me, we knew it would happen eventually." He lamented while looking up, anywhere that wasn't Mark's eyes. It's almost as if he could feel the pain and tension rolling around the air, all the words left unsaid.

"We don't know Roger, it could just be-"

"Let's not pretend that it's anything other than what it is." Roger snapped in reply.

The loft went quiet for a moment, each man pondering their own future. Roger, his state of mortality and Mark, his state of pure loneliness.

"I-""You-"

They started at the same time. Looking down. Each waiting for the other to make the first move- to initiate the apology. Mark gave in, because he can't stand to see a gap between him and his lover. Especially not now.

He reached his arms around Roger's too small waist, just holding him. Savouring the moment because he knew that in a month, a year, he wouldn't be able to hold Roger like this. He wouldn't be able to feel his heartbeat or his muffled breaths. He felt Roger's breath hitch and the wetness pool on his shoulder.

"Shh." He soothed while petting the guitarist's hair, a gesture he used the use during the days of withdrawal. The darkest moments of their relationship, yet somehow they had come out stronger at the end of it. Roger especially.

It was a gesture he knew would always calm Roger down, just like he knew all Roger's sensitive spots, and the spots that got his temper up. Mark just knew, and that was the end of that. Roger leaned into the touch, sighing before propping his chin on Mark's shoulder.

"Mark?" He asked, his worn voice making him sound like a child asking a parent for reassurance. In essence, Mark had become a parental figure to Roger, as much as he had become his best friend, his lover, his life support. It was an essential figure of their relationship, and something Mark wouldn't give for the world.

"Yes, I'm here." Mark replied, giving Roger the reassurance he knew the other man so desperately needed. That was how they worked. You never had to tell the other what you needed, or what you were thinking; they just knew.

"I don't want to die." He stated in such a small, broken voice that if Mark hadn't been so close and so attuned to Roger's husky voice, that he wouldn't have heard it at all. "I'm not ready, I'm not."

Mark just held him tighter. "I know. I know." He rubbed small circles on his back, the only comfort he could give him since he no longer trusted his voice not to break. What he doesn't say however, is that he's not ready for Roger to die either. That they'd already buried Mimi and Collins and he's really just not ready to live alone.

Roger drew him in to a teary kiss. One of many they've shared over the past year and a bit, but this one is different too.

This is one of the first last kisses. A kiss that says 'I need you' and is full of passion and love and twenty something years of trust deep within their souls. They savoured the moment, kissing as if they'll never kiss again. They drown each other in life because reality is, Roger needs all the life he can get.

There are forty last kisses, to be exact. Forty passionate moments that Mark couldn't forget for the world, even if he tried, or wanted to.

In the end, he was glad they had those moments. Glad that he had those sensory memories of Roger to add to the endless film and photo collections. The memory of one of those kisses was still enough to send thrills to Mark's toes, almost enough to make him reach out for his lover, as if he was still right there.

But, five weeks after the first last kiss, five days after the last one, Mark wished that there had been more of them. He wished there had been less fights, less hiding and more chances.

For a moment, he remembered the little brown haired boy with the blazing green eyes who had stared at him for the first week of kindergarten. The same boy who had painted him a pictured of a guitar with four strings and introduced himself by saying:"Hi Marky, my name's Roger Davis and I'm gonna be a famous rock star." With his devilish shit eating grin.

Mark wished he had have kissed him then.


End file.
